First off, we’d like to remind everyone that the talent system is now live in the Frontline beta! So jump in there and test them out. Some systems have been slightly reworked or extended to facilitate some of the Talent effects, so the potential for amazing bugs is vast! Upon loading an old character, all skill points will auto-refund and adapt to the new system.

Another new addition in this update is the ability to refund skill points! This is something that has been suggested and discussed for a long time now, and it has never been an extremely prioritized topic (partly because of the /respec cheat already in game). With the advent of Talents, however, we decided to test this feature out.

For a fair bit of gold, you can refund a skill point you might have misplaced or began to regret! The cost scales with level (currently 100 gold per level gained), so it should always be a cost that stings at least a bit.

Oh, and something you might’ve noticed just from looking at the screenshot above: we’re removing a charge level from all active spells. There are three reasons behind this.

For one, finding openings forcharging up is hard as it is, and will only get harder as you gain more charge levels. Having three charge upgrades instead of four helps a bit in this regard. This is probably the smallest issue, even.

Another reason is that having five different charges makes for a pretty awkward power curve. Preferably, the Silver, Gold and Ultimate charges would all need to be significant upgrades compared to their previous charge level. This meant the Gold charge would have to be “really cool but not too cool since we must add a fifth power level after it”.

What we’ll do now is that you just skip that step, and will get the best version of the skill at level 10 (which will be acquired at character level 19 with the current system).

Finally, we acknowledge that it would probably technically be possible to get the five step power curve to feel alright, but we always have to keep in mind the development time (including testing and balance revisions).

We doubt very much that the previous Gold charge would have added a ton compared to “just” having four charge levels, but it would mean many hours of brain storming, animating, implementation and tuning.

(Please note that we’ve still not implemented the final charge! This will probably come after the next temple is in the game)

I’m completely fine with the changes, I can see your reasoning behind them. Anyway, good luck, and I can’t wait to see the next temple and Final charge!

Dri wrote at 19/08/2014 01:09:

That border around the skill icon and those bubble bars don’t look like the new teal color. Please save my OCD and tint the bar and bubbles to the new teal cystal color! D:

Potem wrote at 19/08/2014 01:50:

AT LAAAAAAAST JEEEEBUS!

Tarquinn2049 wrote at 19/08/2014 05:50:

Awesome update!

Definitely looking forward to seeing the final charge for the skills eventually. Kind of relieved there is only going to be one more rank. You are totally right.

oh, and speaking of OCD, any chance you can tag that uncategorized weekly recap… not a huge deal, but it’s been that way for over a year. I just figured someone would notice it, hehe.

Sogomn wrote at 19/08/2014 14:44:

As I said last post: The system is great!
And I have to agree with you, it was harder with multiple skill charges, especially in later areas since there are many enemies which can interrupt you charging the spell. Gonna give the system a try right away ;)

Theodore (administrator) wrote at 19/08/2014 15:58:

@Tarquinn: There you go! Apologies for making you suffer through that for an entire year :D

Qortzkt wrote at 20/08/2014 21:48:

Guess I could say lots of things, but the time… the time…
Anyway, there’s one particular thing I have to mention: I love the firebird, the final charge level of the fireball! :)